The Black Informant | African American Commentary, News and Community Building

Wow, we didn’t get into that kind of depth when I was in 8th grade social studies. It’s like having beef stew without the ‘meat and potatoes’, you got nuthin but a watered down broth with some celery.

I can’t remember what we were tested for in “civics” in 8th grade, but I’m pretty sure I didn’t know these things.

My son is in 7th grade. An “A” student… product of private education…where he is supposed to be two grades ahead. I know that he never had most of the material addressed on this test.

I will print a copy and teach him. Thank you.

Hooray for parents. TEACH YOUR KIDS WHAT YOU WANT THEM TO KNOW…. My son is (who will be 6 on Friday) can tell you who the cabinet members are. Okay I admit I come from a political family and my father is a high school political science teacher and I come from a family of educators. If we wait on the overcrowded undermanned school system then I kids will continue to perform poorly… Be the solution…. But yes Duane I get your point….

Amen Saudia!

What’s the point of knowing the names of all the cabinet members? That’s pretty much useless information by itself.

This test looks exactly like what I would have taken in 7th grade as a student in Panama City Fla. back in 1970.

I think that test like these explain pretty clearly to me why my peers, age and origins, tend to be conservative, and those who are younger and western and northern coast would fail this test and tend not to be conservative.

Do we know if that was an open-book or take-home test?

Still, it’s a lot more than 8th grade students get now, but it doies make a difference in terms of the teacher’s expectations.

I was in 8th grade about a decade later, 1962-3 (big-city public school system), and we got all that material but I don’t recall we would have been expected to know it all from memory. We might have had to name, say, 7 of the Supreme Court justices rather than all 9.

As I was in school in 54 I think I could gotten a passing grade but not a 981/2..

Whew! Duane, if I can convince my mom to write an excuse note, can I take a make-up exam next week?

A couple of years I opened up one of my grandmother’s eighth grade textbooks and found an essay she’d written for the class. I can say without qualification that any one of my profs in grad school would have been thrilled to have had her as a student at that stage of her scholarly development rather than the coddled, over-aged US-educated slackers they were – and still are – forced to pass along through their program. She was intellectually light years ahead of most of them & at half their age!

Very humbling post – thanks! I’ll be sending this one to everyone I know to make them feel just as inadequate as I feel right now.

I bet todays college kids can’t answer this test. Unless Jon Stewart gave it.

The test taker got question 91 incorrect but it wasn’t caught by the teacher.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_of_attainder

I passed, of course I was in 8th grade in 1954. I can still smell that purple “ditto” machine ink on the test paper!

I could not name all the cabinet positions and who holds them, would have done better under W, but still no

amendments – missed 3,6,9,11,19,20

missed q 75
got 84 but did not know the 2/3 part.. so missed that too
missed 93
98, 100 are political – but he answered right imo

I could not write the preamble from memory

As someone who was a Sr. in High School when Ike was President I can explain this. Before JFK most schools had standards which students had to meet to be promoted. I was in the 8th grade wit a friend who was 3 years older. Reason: Bellflower had standards for promotion from 7th grade. Besides knowing where “at” goes in a sentence (hint not at the end!) you had to be able to calculate square root. Jimmy could not figure square root and spent 3 years in 7 th grade. He quits high school his sophomore year.
When JFK came in he said too many kids had their fragile psyches hurt by flunking. So he mandated a policy that the Minute Men derisively called “social promotion” Warm a seat for 8 months and get promoted. 48 years later and it still is the policy of most schools in America/

Yes it looks intense, but memorization is just a matter of study and association. What I want to know is how know all of this benefited the kid in his life. The main problem with America’s education is that kids aren’t taught history, and what little they are taught is written by politically correct liberals.

Thank goodness I graduated in 1954.
I was also in AF basic training in 1954.

This is a product of no child left behind. The Department of Education was started in 1980 and since then it has gone straight downhill. I remember memorizing the Preamble in grade school in the late 70′s. I wonder how many since 1980 has had to do that.

As I recall, this was called the Constitution test and was required for graduating from 8th grade. The students were taught the content which is not a trivial thing, but it certainly doesn’t take a genius to memorize the answers.

Civics was not taught in my school for the college bound students. We had French, Algebra, Latin in its place during the 8th grade. The students that were collge bound did not have to learn anything until they got to college. By the way, I heard about that test, hence I decided to go to college instead!

I was in 8th grade in 1999 (public school), and I’m actually not that impressed. This is just rote memorization, nothing a few flash cards can’t drill into the brain. (And then promptly forget).

I dug up an exam I took on the Revolutionary War in 8th grade, and it included four essay questions, each of which I answered in about 300 words. One explored women’s role in the war, another gave a detailed account of the Boston Massacre and its significance, and the last two described the lives of Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson and their effects on the US government. It was as if we were actually expected to generate thoughtful answers to questions 98, 99, and 100 above.

I would have answered 57 as “checks and balances.”

I also would have snarkily answered 84 as “if he can get away with it.”

I was actually taught this in school, but I went to a very small private school. Sadly, this is way above people’s heads these days.

What is this document called the Constitution? As an aside, it took me four attempts to get the spam protection answer. Thankfully, I had a calculator nearby. lol.

This exam is similar to one I took in my 8th grade civics class in 1981. I didn’t have to know all the people in the Cabinet, but I did have to know all the Justices and Amendments and answer similar questions. I guess I either lucked out in having a decent public school or the destruction of the education system began after my school years. Since the Department of Education was formed just prior to my exam, I think its the latter.

Let’s look at why this memorization test might have been required: because in the absence of the Internet and laptops or smartphones, people had to store all this information in their brains. Memorization is a useful trick for your gray matter, but it’s not the end-all of education. What about questions like this: “If the First Amendment were undermined by supreme court decisions, how might that affect your freedom?”

Constitution? Isn’t that what USSR and Venezuela has to tell them how to strip freedoms from their people.

I was in eighth grade in 1952 and we had a very active Civics program that included writing and passing a bill so we understood all the steps. I don’t know that we had a test as difficult as that one but it was close. Civics has, of course, disappeared from the curriculum even though my kids went to private school.

There are some stupid modern phrases about “learning how to learn” that disparage “rote memorization.” But a memorized knowledge base is necessary for any deep thought.

If you don’t already know the contours of the civil war, you can’t even competently use Wikipedia as a crutch. And Wikipedia’s a pretty bad crutch for anything more substantive than blog comment debates.

What does it matter? Those who answered those questions correctly created/supported the Ponzi schemes called Social Security and medicare and their children invented Obama/Pelosi Care. Have your children study Chinese.

The Preamble as written by the student is missing the words “of liberty” after “secure the blessings of”, but it’s marked correct. Still, pretty good. Keep in mind, that while for us, without study, it’s difficult, imagine if you’d been studying this for a week. I think many of us would do quite well.

I have to admit though that I can’t recite the preamble without singing it to the tune used in School House Rock. At least I do know it.

That’s the exact kind of test I would have memorized and then quickly forgotten two days later.

It’s all simple single-answer factual questions, or “memorized knowledge” as Kevin J Jones called it. Nowhere based on this test can we determine a child’s ability to THINK, only to memorize.

Let’s see an essay from an 8th grader in 1954 and then we can consider the steady withering of our mindgrapes. And let’s not forget that there were probably plenty of slackers/troublemaker kids in 1954 that would bomb this. Just like there are now.

And I also can only recall the preamble as I recite the School House Rock song in my head.

I’m a 2003 High School Graduate from a Missouri public school. I had to memorize the constitutional amendments in 7th grade. I had to do an entire project known as the “World Leaders Project” in which I gathered newspaper/magazine pictures(no internet) of over 200 world leaders(Asian Tigers, OPEC, NAFTA included), and I had to identify them. This was required by the school to complete the 7th grade in my social studies class.

I can tell you that kids today do not know nearly enough about the world they live in, especially their own country, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t being taught this stuff.

The problem lies solely with parents that do not continue the education in their homes, whether it be math, social structures, history, or even just good manners. Go tell your kid who the Speaker of the House is, and what she does for a living. Go tell your kid why the NRA exists, and how the electoral college works in relationship to the popular vote.

It may have already been taught to children in school, but it’s your responsibility as a parent to reinforce the teachings OUTSIDE of school, lest all of that information become lost in TV and mindless facebooking.

This is pretty impressive, and I think this particular type of material should be considered very important in education. It may not have a direct bearing on everyday life, but anything that reduces the mystique of government operation should help result in a better informed populace.

It’s a lot easier to care about who’s secretary of state when you at least have a vague idea of what the position entails. Otherwise, it’s just “some person in charge of something.”

This is a prime example of rote memorization. Even though the kid could regurgitate all of that information I doubt he could explain why any of it mattered.

Anyone else notice the question asking for the names of the Supreme Court justices misspelled “Give?”

I feel slightly vindicated. As the generation being disparaged by a lot of commenters, I think you can also rest easily that there ARE resources who can teach kids to know these facts off hand. Parents are one, and pushing children to pursue Advanced Placement and Gifted and Talented learning programs is another.

It takes a family…

The real question is could anyone on here name the next 5 amendments to the Constitution not mentioned here…

I went to a private Lutheran high school. Graduated in 2002. I definitely learned all of this stuff in high school. I don’t remember if we learned any of it in 8th grade, I’m sure some of it, but not all. But I remember tests almost exactly like this from when I was in high school.

I see ZERO real knowledge on this exam. Just a pile of facts nicely memorized. This is the kind pablum that just creates more lawyers. Whoopee!! What were the 1954 calculus and physics standards like?
-rufus

The kid who took this test would have failed if he his penmanship was inaccurate, or if he had written it in block letters. To be perfectly honest, I consider penmanship to be at least as relevant to an understanding of American values as rote memorization of the names of the members of the Supreme Court and the Cabinet members.

Without an understanding of what these people do, what they stand for, and what court cases they’ve presided over, memorizing the names of the members of the Supreme Court or the Cabinet is nothing more than “Dear Leader John G Roberts Jr” hero worship. Garbage.

I attended school in the 80′s and 90′s. I had to memorize the preamble to the Constitution and I can still recite it. Our education system in America not perfect and needs much improvement, but if you want students today to memorize the Constitution, our President’s cabinet, then they can. It’s all about memorization. Please do not think that this person from 1954 is a superhero, nor think that children/educators today are inept.

And I am sure this kid forgot most of what was on the test weeks after it was given, just like the premise of ‘smarter than a fifth-grader’ I used to know that stuff too, but now I work in radiology and have little use for that.

I had to do junk like this in middle school. Of course, I can’t remember any of it now. I had a 7th grade S.S teacher that basically made us memorize the Tennessee Blue Book. Then again, it was the 2000 election year and this stuff was on everybody’s minds. Since then, I haven’t had a harder class. My Senior year Gov’t class was easier than 7th grade. I guess I’m just trying to say that an 8th grade test like this isn’t to farfetched.

P.S. I’m not trying to brag because I barely passed.

TI agree with douglas – a week of studying the material would make a huge difference. I knew the capitals of all 50 states as a child (I remember when Alaska and Hawaii became states, by the way) but I don’t any more. What is missing here, however, is an example of a test from today.

But most of that information is useless, and all of it is memorization. Sure our education system is wack, but mass memorization is not useful in most jobs. We need to teach kids to think.

Im 24 years old, and therefore was an eight grader in the not too distant past. When I was in school we learned all of those things. And were tested on them. We had to learn all the positions in the three branches of govt. memorize the amendments, the preambles to both the constitution and the declaration of ind., and all the states and capitals. Ive seen a few of these old tests that circulate the internet and have not been impressed by any of them as i had to learn the same things not too long ago in a public school, in the south on top of that. If the education system has really become so lax that people not only accept that these basics are not being taught in school, but expect it, than there is something wrong with the system that the older generation is responsible for and needs to be fixed. Remember all you parents and old people reading this test and being appalled by the education todays kids are receiving that it is you who now controls the system, you who determines the curriculum taught in schools, and you who tolerates the dumbing down of the education system in america. not the youth. bring science back to the classroom, reaffirm an emphasis on history, stop our schools from becoming a purgatory between infancy and a mediocre adulthood.

i would like to point out that this material is strict rote memorization, not much analysis going on there. anybody can memorize things, that doesn’t make you smart.

Frankly, most of the material in this test is useless for an 8th grader. I have read most of the comments and am shocked by their narrow-minded, backward-thinking nature. Get a life.

Reading these over these comments what I’m actually struck by is that for conservatives it has become axiomatic that they are smarter, harder working, more patriotic, moral, ethical, and just all around better persons in every way than anyone who doesn’t subscribe to their philosophy.

It’s somewhat misleading to say “smarter” in the title. The kids of
1954 aren’t any smarter than the kids today (or you for that matter).
What they had was more in depth studying and memorization of topics
that are no longer deemed important in the current school system.
If it were possible to give a group of kids from 1954 a test of the
commonly known information that a kid needs to survive today, they would fail miserably. That’s not to mistake study topics with academic rigor and expectations, which has declined since 1954.

We were actually not very good at teaching back then. We didn’t teach to ability and we concentrated on facts rather than how to think. Things have actually improved in many regards. Many foreign countries still teach that way, and its not very beneficial. Knowing this in 8th grade means you forget it by 9th. Its not pertinent to an 8th graders world, and so it does not stick. I don’t find this article to say much of anything. If they taught current old people to think like this in the 50′s, it didn’t seem to do you much good.

This is very incorrect.
Our children are learning things now adays you would say, “The fuck is that” too. There are smarter students and there are dumber students what do you expect, do you think not one kid in the class where that test was given got an F?

To be honest i bet the one shown was the best in the class which wasn’t even 100%. I’ve been in highschool recently and i know lots of people who get 100%’s easy on tests.

Plus back than you learned algebra in like 12th grade.
You learn it in 7th now lol

There’s much more accumulated information these days and so little time to absorb it. I think knowing how to find and analyze information is more important than simple memorization of facts and figures. That being said, I don’t want to belittle what was taught back then, and that 8th grader deserved a pat on the back for the “A”.

This is not a test of knowledge, it’s a test of government propaganda. Math, english, art, geography are all matters to be taught at school but not this.

I’m glad my kids don’t have to learn this BS.

its a knowledge test….it has nothing to do with intelligence.

Now ask that same student in 1954 to do calculus. Yep, schools are starting that early. While I agree students lack basic fundamental knowledge of our government, we also expect a lot more of our students. Besides, this is one student from one school.

If you also remember 1954 was during the Cold War & the famous McCarthy hearings. The Red Scare opened up a whole new patriotism all across America and some would argue paranoia.

I graduated with a degree in History last year and it still amazes me how our own politicians get it wrong.

This is just useless memorization. Who cares who the current justice and cabinet members names are? I’d be more impressed if they had to list all the positions and their roles. There is absolutely no depth or demonstration of understanding in this test.

How did the rest of the class do?

I learned all of this during the 8th grade and it was reiterated in 11th grade government which I took as a correspondence course. I don’t really see a difference in the test I took as an 8th grader and this one. I went to a public school in rural northwest Ohio. I graduated in 2004 from high school. Most people (I admit even me) just forget all of this right after they learn it for the test. I do agree however, that they should teach more of the current government such as who holds what office and what they do. This would be beneficial for those students with an interest in government and would give kids some current political knowledge.

I’m surprised so many people are saying that they haven’t done this test. When I was in 8th grade, approximately 15 years ago, I took a very similar test. I was told it was required that all schools taught, and tested, the constitution and basic civics.

Answer: No

It’s amazing how much more thorough schooling was back then (from what I understand. I wasn’t alive yet.)

As I go through college and memorize all sorts of stuff, usually just rote memorization, I do see the value in it. The main thing I remember memorizing in elementary school was the multiplication tables and it was obviously worth it. I think today memorization has lost favor relative to “critical thinking” but how are kids supposed to critically think about things if they don’t have the language to put complex thought together?

On the other hand, maybe at the time kids were so busy memorizing names that they were never given the opportunity to do anything with them, which seems to defeat the purpose?

I don’t know where you guys went to school but I had to take tests like this in 8th grade in public school in the suburbs of Chicago (not to be confused with Chicago Public Schools). This looks a lot like the 8th grade mandatory constitution test to me.

Lol, this is funny…
I cannot believe you people think this information is relevant at all.
given society and where we are at as humans, this is a complete waste of time.

teach your kids something worth knowing.
this is lame.

I took the 8th grade constitution test in 2000 and it was pretty similar to this one even the entire preamble and amendments. We didn’t have to know who the cabinet members were just what the different positions were.

Honestly it was all memorization. Not hard at all.

I agree with matt earlier. While it is impressive, most of this information is rote memorization. Not helpful in the least. granted, SOME of this information MAY be useful for someone going into law, but other than that, its not helpful in the least. Our education is not lessened, it’s just different. the students we have now (the competent ones at least) can do advanced algebra and show interest in the science departments and write far better they ever could before.

This does not impress me. The questions are about a single country’s arbitrary system of government, and some of the questions are subjective and opinion-based. “Does a dictator consider the welfare of the people?” Well, maybe. It’s possible. But the teacher is not interested in a real answer, only that the student recites the virtues of his own country’s current political system. This is an exercise in rote memorization (i.e. indoctrination). This is something that happens in virtually every country in the world. As a person who values objectivity above all else, I find this to be distasteful.

If this were physics, or math, or some other more objective subject, I would be much more impressed.

What good would knowing this pointless crap serve a child. Congratulations you can name the current cabinet and justices of the supreme court. That knowledge will be worthless in 4-10 years. Oh congratulations again to you kid for being able to recite all the amendments to the constitution. Rely on that as your source of legal authority when the police are busting you. “But officer so what if im in a shopping mall, havent you heard about the 2nd amendment to the constitution? I have the right to bear arms. Geez didnt you learn that in 8th Grade?”

Im in law school and I couldnt pass a test like this. Does it Matter? Depends on which skill you think is better, being able to recite memorized phrases like a zombie or being able to come up with something new in your head to say?

I graduated high school in 2006- I remember one of the fifth grade classes in my school had to learn it, but none of the rest of us were required. I guess their teacher figured it was important and ours didn’t. I never took a civics class, participating in government class, or other government-related studies until a half-year course in 12th grade called Doc Law- where we talked about Sandra Day O’Connor and watched My Cousin Vinny. I learned absolutely nothing.

It’s sad how low the standard of education has dropped in the US. Every generation has it worse than the one before- if

We had to know all of the ammendments for my 12th grade AP Social Studies class (2002)…I know I had been over them two or three times before that because it was annoying to have to go over info we’d already learned the past few years. Don’t think I’d do very well at repeating them now, though, because I haven’t used that knowledge since I got out of high school.

Thanks to “School House Rock!” I could do the Preamble with no problem. The creators of that show were geniuses.

I don’t think I’ve ever known any of the cabinet members, and honestly don’t know why I would need to know their names…can’t really do anything to change who the President picks for his cabinet, but I sure would like to know about their thoughts and opinions so I know what to expect of my government.

My point is…a lot of this is still taught, but the problem is it’s never USED for anything. It’s just “memorize this then repeat it later” and after you’ve repeated it you never have to use it. There’s never any context for it, or any show of why it’s important or how you would use it, so it’s not retained. Anyone who is used to standardized testing knows that you only have to remember the info long enough to fill in the scantron bubble, and then you’ll likely never need to use it again. (Horray education!)

this is comparing smarts with rote memorization. frankly i dont care, and neither should you, if the education system doesnt teach them all of this. teach them to problem solve, not to remember a list.

Problem is if you expected students to memorize this stuff today Republicans would be up in arms about “indoctrinating” our youth. They’d be bellyaching that teaching about this stuff is taking time from their Biology class; titled “God Did It”.

And as another commenter mentioned, lets see what these 8th graders were doing for Math or Science? I guarantee you that I could have run circles around any one of these kids on something like a calculus exam, which is slightly more useful than knowing the preamble to the constitution.

There is a place for rote memorization, but this test is simply an example of how much can you cram in. It’s much like biology classes of the same era “memorize every bone in the body” or chemistry classes “memorize the atomic weights of every element”. In the real world, those skills are useless. A chemist will have a copy of the periodic table handy if they need to look up an atomic weight.

Thankfully, today, we do spend time teaching kids how to learn, which is much more important than teaching them how to memorize. I wonder if this student, given the same test today, would be able to do nearly as well. Would they know the current members of the cabinet? Current supreme court justices? Which congress-members are pro-rape and vote as such? Doubtful.

Looks pretty tough!

I really do not feel like kids are missing out by not learning the answers on this test. If, like someone stated, this was a constitution test that was taught and memorized in order to pass 8th grade it is really no different than the math, reading, science, and english tests that 8th graders these days would also need to pass, and I feel that knowing the core subjects in much more important than memorizing the constitution and cabinet members.

Judging only by this test (which is of course not enough to make any judgments), schools have not improved, but at least they haven’t gotten any worse. Schools still require that kids memorize trivia, and sometimes they even go so far as to give them opinions, and mark them wrong if they disagree. What do you think would have happened if the student had answered those last 3 questions as, “a dictator would have to if he wants to stay in power”, “yes, and here is my idea how…”, and “emotions do not apply in this context.”

When I was in 8th grade, in the 90′s, we learned about American history, and studied the constitution. I don’t know why anybody thinks things have changed based on this test, which looks exactly like one that our teacher might have given us.

Many people are criticizing pure memorization of the quiz’s contents. A base of general knowledge can make a person at worst an automaton and at best a whiz kid on Jeopardy. Still, I imagine this kid went on to take a civics or government course in high school where he learned to interpret the contents’ meaning and application to real life. Memorization alone is not enough to produce a free-thinking rational individual, but it is certainly necessary.

This kid isn’t any more or less smart because he can memorize a bunch of facts. I have always had a hard time understanding why knowing a bunch of random facts makes you “smart”. I can be just as “smart” with a book where I can look them all up. Problem solving, now that is real learning. You can’t just spit out an answer you actually have to think about it and come up with a process and answer for each new problem.

Finding the correct book with all these facts in it would be learning but just know a bunch of facts is not learning. Don’t stress of knowing a bunch of facts that can just be accessed in a book somewhere.

No way to indicate whether this is a take home or open book exam or not as well.

I learned all of this is 7th and 8th grade. I am not sure where most of these commenters went to school.

Ah, I’ve seen better. Actually my own grandma had to remember books by heart. And she had no problem with that. In our modern age, we have everything on our PC and we just don’t need to remember anything.

Pointless. There is absolutely NO reason kids need to know that information. It IS useless memorization. Matt makes a good point and I’ll expand on it. Knowing the names of the cabinet and justices of the surpreme court? Really? It’s just gonna change. They DO teach amendments in 8th grade. The rest is just vocabulary and basic government questions that are covered as well.

Talk about a bunch of trivial facts.

How about taking a look at the difference in math and science from 1954 to the present?

Congrats– you taught an 8th grader to memorize information and recite it.

My nephew, in 8th grade, can program a computer, solve algebra equations, write a geometric proof, and can constantly adjust to a highly complex simulation (warcraft), endlessly trying to optimize character traits and equipment in order to get maximal performance.

And, if he’s ever curious what the first and last name of the current secretary of the interior, he can instantly look it.

When you look at the numbers, kids today could mop the floor with their earlier American counterparts. It’s just not a fair fight– kids in the 1950 didn’t have the same kind of access to information. Radio, up to three channels of television, and print. That’s it.

Today’s kids _live_ in a world of information. Hundreds of channels full of information, age-appropriate educational and entertainment information for all age and gender groups. Playstations and Gamecubes and Wiis and Faceboook and Wikipedia.

If the goal is to memorize a fixed set of data, then the world of the 1950s was better.

But if the goal is to produce as intelligent a person as possible, then the present population is, in fact, the most intelligent in human history.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect

hold up wait a minute is right. This is a memory test and all it does it tests the individual’s memory or mnemonic devices. The fact that so many of you are impressed by this feat demonstrates how little many of you understand about how education works.

I graduated in 1992, National Honor Society. I scored in the 99th percentile of every standardized test they gave. There was a teacher in 9th grade who gave tests like this. Everyone would sit in the halls for hours beforehand, cramming. Nobody retained it after the test. I remember almost nothing about that year. We all thought he was a burnt-out crackpot who just read off the same notes year after year, droning away. If you approached him after class to go more in-depth about a particular subject, he’d tell you everything you need to know for the test was given in class and that you should have taken better notes. What a waste of time. Turns out he was banging a 14-year old student on his desk, then 10 years later she applied for a job as a volleyball coach, got rejected and blew the whistle. THAT I remember.

Those mimeographed tests smelled so good. The first section is poorly laid out. It should be a column of letters along with a column of numbers for matching. Any modern eighth grader could learn this stuff if taught properly. Problem is, they’d all turn into lawyers, and who wants that?

This test is stupid. It looks like a simplified version of the notes I took during my civics class in 6th grade. The tests involved actual critical thinking and essay responses instead of canned answers and memorization.

learning POLITICIANS NAMES AND POSITIONS shouldn’t be considered the bleeding edge of knowledge and wisdom in life and the world. these are ONLY names. and surely, books were used to study with. I’m pretty sure ALL kids have to take tests on the constitution and rights, most requiring that they recall things like the preamble from memory (sometimes aloud).

it’s fine to learn history, but where does it end? must we need to know every date and every name of politicians from the founding of this country until now?

to me this is really not a difficult test even for an 8th grader who has studied.

WOW! A whole lot to memorize!

if you want to see how the public school systems have failed lets start with the suppression of creativity…

i’m 25, and i remember quite clearly the 8th grade Constitution test everyone at my jr. high school took at the end of the year. We were required to know all of the information requested on the 1954 test above.

i agree that our public schools are in pretty bad shape, but gotta give credit where credit’s due…

American heritage… Isn’t is sufficient for 8th graders in the U.S. to remember your contribution to the world’s history? Indeed: Pacman and perhaps the Jackson family. Or maybe just pacman and a nipple slip.

I learned these in 9th grade. i just graduated high school last year. and i still remember most of these. thank you, mr. hoey.

I doubt the test was not open book. I’m sure they got to do research.

Besides that, some of these things listed here were taught. I am able to answer many of the questions, but not all.

If it is true that they had a better education, then what happened?

This is a test of memorization. Students will learn the answers for the test and forget them down the road. I’m glad we’re teaching our students more functional things these days. Kids can look up this information online in minutes so I’m glad we’re not wasting out time teaching this anymore. We have more important things to teach these days.

Intelligence is not merely memorizing facts. I don’t see a single question that requires a modicum of judgment, simply regurgitating data. If it was about Russia in the 1970′s or North Korea now, people would be screaming “indoctrination!”.

Every so often you see some example of what kids were taught during a certain period and we are supposed to lament how far we have fallen. Let’s take a step back here. Kids today are taught far more about computers, foreign languages/cultures and other things that may actually help them compete in real world situations. Think any of those “facts” will show up in a job interview? Probably not. Better yet, instead of rote memorization we teach kids logic and critical thinking skills.

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Good Lord…I’m a sophomore in high school and I NEVER learned this in Civics; we had an open-book test on the Constitution.

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my name is jacob, i went to a catholic school and pretty much had this exact test. goes to show that a private education is much better than a public one – which is pathetic. the teachers at the schools are capable but its these ghetto kids. if you axed them cats these questions they would go tell their mama and pops who would be pissed that there wasnt a question on martin luther. wait, what. im real……

One problem, the country and terms listed in these documents no longer exists thanks to the Patriot Act I and II. Whoops.

I teach 8th grade civics and economics, and I think our tests are around 10 times harder than this. Most people can memorize facts and spit them out onto a test. Our test require a lot of critical thinking and application of complex ideas. I think it’s important that kids get some basic facts straight first, of course, but this sort of test would be a small part of a basic quiz I might give. The multiple choice tests we use are WAY more difficult.

Great. A memory test. It might have well been a vocabulary test. Doesn’t mean the student knows anything about those people, or have an understanding of the meaning of the constitution.

I’m an English teacher in Japan and thats exactly what their education system is structured around. Memorizing facts, words, math problems, and kanji. The kids lack any deep understanding or reasoning skills. God forbid you ever ask them to state an opinion and back it up with reason.

Its this rigid structuring of education that makes it impossible for the kids to learn English. Its great for learning how to read and write 1,500 kanji, but makes it near impossible for anyone to grasp the English language.

I’ll take the current US education style any day over Japan/ 1950s America.

its funny i went to a crappy public school and my 8th grade American history teacher made us learn most of that, but like a good student i have since forgotten all of it

I always have the same question for those who defend the current education system with its lack of emphasis on rote memorization: Can you document in any way that today’s graduates have great insights and thinking skills and all the other things they were supposedly learning instead of mere facts?

That said, I look at this test and think about what a great test you could come up with if you took each section and asked a question requiring some real understanding. For the cabinet members, you could ask about the functions of each department. You could ask about the importance of having the military report to a civilian Department of Defense, and what difference it makes in other countries to not have civilian control of the military in the same way as we have.

For the Constitution, you could ask about a few key controversial areas of interpretation over the centuries: interstate commerce, states’ rights, the origins of judicial review, nullification by states, the incorporation doctrine and the 14th amendment, etc.

For the legislative and executive branches, you could test their understanding of the interaction between the two: vetoes and overrides, ratification of treaties and appointments and judicial nominees, etc.

The testing would probably take more than one class period to really get the students to demonstrate understanding.

Most adults of all ages today seem to have an F-grade understanding of how the government works. But they all get to vote!

in today’s government, this is almost considered a crime (the knowledge of the people of their “we the people”). mainstream propaganda would say without hesitation that any person who dares to say that the dept. of education y controlled by the same criminals who control washington is a conspiracy theorist. this is our SACRED LAW of the land and congress, senate and the white house uses it as toilet paper. gee! i wonder why…

I believe that education should be about learning how to learn. Stuff like this would be perfectly appropriate for 8th graders. The problem is that schools have become bastions of leftist indoctrination and early age branding rather than free choice institutions of learning.

To think critically, first you must know something to think critically about. The ability to absorb and retain information is a precursor to the more advanced skills of critical thinking. In putting more emphasis on faux-critical thinking at earlier and earlier grades we are depriving students of the skills necessary to actually do it once they mature. This test is a fantastic exercise for someone in 8th grade. Success at learning and retention builds the foundation for important future skill development.

Superchicken, what evidence or examples would you care to provide to support your contention that schools are “bastions of leftist indoctrination” ?

Impressive, indeed. Sorry if my question has already been asked and answered. There are just so many posts. I couldn’t read them all very thoroughly. I’m just curious from what state these quizzes are taken. I grew up in PA, but I teach in CA. I think the education I got in PA in the 80s (granted, not the 50s) was much more comprehensive than what I am supposed to teach now. Does anyone know from what state these are taken?

I am very surprised by people who do not understand the purpose of knowing the above information…. If more people understood the inner workings of the government and who does what, we would be better able to make a decisions on who to vote for in the 1st place. (keeping in mind who their allies are and who they might put in key positions ie: Rahm Emanuel, Hillary Clinton, Eric Holder) Kids will learn critical thinking in high school and college. These type of tests or better yet this line of education is merely the foundation of things to come. Knowing this information allowed me to excel in political theory class in college. I recently had to put my son in public school. There were 5 years old that were not able to recognize the alphabet. You must lay a foundation to build upon. No, knowing the names and positions of the cabinet members is not likely to help you in terms of finding a job. However, it is imperative that we know who does what in our government. But I’m just saying….

I thought Ike had only 9 cabinet members: 8 millionaires and a plumber.

All of you who stand up for the “wonderful” and “creative” education that our kids are getting today, I have a few questions for you.

1. Why can’t teens at the cash register do simple math? Was learning the times tables too suppressive of their creativity?

2. Why can’t many of our high school graduates read? Was teaching phonics too “old-fashioned” and not technologically advanced enough?

3. Someone made the comment that kids can look up these things online and it’s good they are not wasting their time learning these rote facts. And I ask, Do the kids actually look up this kind of stuff? In my experience, they are much more interested in playing games on the computer than researching.

4. How can you apply information to situations in daily life if you can’t remember the facts that the applications must be based on?

Yes, I agree that the test above is mostly just rote memorization; however, if you don’t exercise the part of your brain that memorizes, you risk losing the ability more quickly later in life than the student who does memorize large amounts of information.

So, VA Teacher (@101), have you ever given such a quiz coverning this subject, with as many questions, even in a multiple choice format? I would suspect not, and if so, you are one of a few.
Today’s government ( a corporation ) is so far removed from the Constitution the they wouldn’t know it even if they saw it.

The spam protection asked me “Sum of 1 + 7 ?” I had to ask someone for help on that one or I couldn’t have commented.

Where is the “Multiple Choice” section? At least then I have a 25% chance of getting the answer right.

i dont know if it is still true but i went to 8th grade in Illinois and i had to pass a constitution test to graduate … however i didnt have to know all the names

The majority of this quiz is lower-ordered thinking. Facts that students must memorize and recite. This type of information is less likely to be retained and takes no critical thinking. It’s very likely that the student that took this quiz forgot most of the information by the next year.

I teach 8th grade mathematics at a school that is deemed “failing” and I can tell you that at our school students are held to much higher standards than this. Students are working in groups to represent each part of the law making process and creating their own classroom laws. They are creating comics and stories to represent the bill making process. They are asked to imagine what the outcome would be if one of those amendments were not included in the Constitution. This requires students to not only know what the amendment stands for, but evaluate its significance in our lives.

I would argue that this shows our education system has made great strides.

Marty, In 1954 there was no such thing as an open book test!

OK all you people who say big deal, math is the true indicator.
Smash your calculator and computer and begin. Whats that, can’t do calculus without them? People in 1954 could.

You guys should see the math’s papers!

wow… 8th grade from the olden days sure have a lot of things to recite and memorize… Unlike students nowadays. I’m also one of the universities student. But to me, reciting and memorizing without getting/understanding the meaning behind the fact or names that you are reciting is useless… Believe me, in a few month it will go away, flying out of your mind…
Therefore, i think the best method is to make sure that your kids nowadays to read and understand what they are reading… at least by understanding the content of the fact that they’re reading, they will be able to learn something. Memorizing cannot be considered as part of learning process… am i right?

But can he name the three dozen czars?

The comparison of education from the year 1954 to now is completely irrelevant. With the integrated use of smart phones and the internet, it is completely unnecessary to memorize all of these facts that reduce the amount of teaching effort put towards CRITICAL THINKING. Facts are easy things to look up; the connection between these facts and being able to understand the reason things exist the way they do because of the influence of various related factors is what education should be moving toward. It is because many people do not think this way that they are so influenced by the media, (liberal or conservative), and do not have the power to think and decide for themselves. Education must not only be reformed in the sense of funding and teacher pensions, but in the way we understand the world… and memorizing facts is not something that is necessary anymore for anyone who can look up those facts in 2 seconds on their iphone. It is simply a waste of time.

The most important role of education is to look at a presented fact/opinion, and being able to deduce the truth and practical application of that information based on the tone and bias of that fact/opinion, and that is not being taught enough.

CRITICAL THINKING

Really!? Is this what cyberspace has become a blackhole with diahrrea We all learn this stuff its government standards. Standardized testing is computerized thinking. Now a days we multiple choice this move on and forget it. Our brains process more information at higher rates. Besides school this kid played outside instead of with controllers. He also had parents that valued the educational system instead of trying to destroy a plausible creationism theory. They were more worried about the racial invasion of civil liberties.

Well I’m not sure about the rest of you all, but I know Georgia’s education system is the grandest but my 8th grade social studies teacher must have stolen this paper somehow. We definitely went over all of this in class and we were tested on it. Now do I remember any of it now, No!! But maybe we need to stop blaming it all on the education system and maybe look at the fault in us, we are human we do forget and in now way can we retain all this information, unless we were to have neural implants or were servants, and yes the education system is in need of some serious reform, but you can’t just talk about it, you have to act upon it.

Yes Mike, I could walk up to Sally Sue in 1951 and she’d be able to calculate the an integral right on the spot. Get real. The calculus problems that are given today are exponentially more difficult then they would have been in the past because there ARE calculators. Compound problems combining integrals, L’Hopital’s Rules, Chain Rule, Limits, etc. were made specifically before the advent of the calculator. Sure people of the past could do problems without them, but it took hours, days, or even weeks to do a problem that someone today could do in 5 minutes.

I learned this in 9th grade. Surprisingly enough, I had excellent and extremely patriotic civics and social studies teachers.

My children will only learn all of this because they will learn it at home.

The only reform education needs is to get the government out of our schools, the calculators, the computers, get back to the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic, put prayer back in (whether you participate or not), and the Pledge of Allegiance.

When I went to school there was concrete beneath the monkey bars, trophies were for winners, and we memorized our times tables. Education in the US today is a joke.

Wow a whole section on things you can google from your phone! Seems like a great way to educate. We could put it all in a little red book and have the kids carrie it at all times, oh wait that’s how the chinese taught when they were behind the rest of the world.

This information, and info like it is useless? Good grief people. If you think that knowing(even memorizing, yes) how our Government is SUPPOSED to work is useless, please, don’t involve yourself in politics. You’re a danger to all of us. You get what we have now. A government that completely blows through it’s constitutional limitations…

You scare me.

Wow! So much hostility on all sides. Some simple facts from my perspective: in order to access that information from your iphone, you need to have some idea WHAT you are looking up; in order to understand the implications of various nominations, proposed bills, etc. you need to understand the framework of our government; in order to do that critical thinking, you need to have some facts about which to think. Without both facts and critical thinking skills, you have a person whose opinions are based solely on either repeating the last thing they heard, or being in opposition to it “just because”. I am choosing to homeschool my children, so that I can ensure that they are being held to high standards for both factual information (last year my 4th grader had to be able to name every state and it’s capital, and point to it on a map – something I learned right along with her, and I have an Ivy League education), and critical thinking skills (yesterday’s history lesson was on the unionization movement at the beginning of the 19th century, and how it compares to the need for/use of unions today). To all of you who commented that the parents must take a more active role – I completely agree – I guarantee that my kids will not enter adulthood ignorant or unable to think for themselves.

As a college student I wish their were more test like this. Yeah their are some things that are not needed to be know, like knowing all cabinet members names or justices names, but knowing what they did would be helpful. Also knowing what the constitution says and what actually is a right by the constitution and what isn’t and what each amendment gives us the right to.
It’s really disappointing to see my fellow students not even know is a difference between their rights and their privileges not to mention many’s lack of knowledge of how the government works and what checks and balances between powers are.
That’s not to say I am much better, only because my dad is a history teacher do I even have a slight understanding of what is contained in the constitution

It would be nice if kids these days had to learn a little about politics, that way they would not be influenced as much by commercials

What use is memorizing a bunch of facts (which will go out of date someday) when the current information is easily accessible in an always-connected culture?

This is the same argument as “Why should Johnny & Mary have to learn long-hand math when they can use a calculator?”

The literacy of the future will be 1. understanding how to use tools to find data and/or information, and 2. understanding how to synthesize knowledge and wisdom from the data and information gathered.

Parents, get with it and get involved with your children’s education – now!

Ah yes, because memorizing and then immediately forgetting a bunch of facts makes all these eighth graders that much better off. There is not a single question on this “test” that requires one to think, and as such this has minimal to no bearing on intelligence.
Congratulations on making yourself look like an idiot, Duane.

Yea im in college and this ***** pretty useless. Most people need to know this will learn it and the rest have too much going to even give two shits about who the justices are

**Edited by site owner**
No cussin’

The above is how it was when my parents went to school, also, and should still be. When I was in school, we barely covered the Bill of Rights, and the signing of the Constitution.
This should still be taught, as shown above. Congress would not get away with nearly as much dishonesty and selfishness if we citizens actually knew what the Constitution says.

Every critic of this test is bound to be an idiot liberal.
This is why our nation is being destroyed; a complete lack of understanding of what the law of the land (the constitution) says we are to be. The failure of the schools to teach children the truth has left them to the wolves of pseudo-intellectual babblers who lead them to believe anyone’s opinion is valid and we are a democracy! Idiots!
Delilah is exactly right, congress, BO and his ilk are getting away with murder because the general public is ignorant of the law and even more sadly ignorant of how the US became the most powerful, generous, and desired nation in the history of the world.
Now we slither toward Gomorrah and the socialist system with it’s 100% historical failure rate like brain dead sheep. Thanks NEA.
(Yep you bet I home schooled my kids; http://www.gravesjudo.com)

Gee Mitch, as a college professor I’m glad you homeschooled your kids. It sounds like they’re getting a really balanced, objective worldview from you.

I encounter several hundred college students every year and I teach political science. This information would be of use to them only inasmuch as it could be connected to an interest in politics, which almost none of them have. Mostly because when they think of politics they think of people like Glenn Beck. Or you. And they’d rather do just about anything on earth rather than listen to BS like you spewed here.

I can teach just about anyone. Except homeschooled kids. They are, without exception, brainwashed, emotionally stunted, and completely incapable of critically thinking. Their idea of making an argument is to repeat whatever survivalist bullshit their wingnut parents drilled into their heads, only louder.

In the grade school years of life, memorizing basic facts is important. It provides a starting point for future in depth learning and analysis. Many people here at least remember the test and the nature of the information. This enables them to have a clue of where to start their search when they want to renew or expand their understanding. It is not enough to have easy access to information. How can you look it up online if you don’t have a clue what you should be looking for? How can you defend your constitutional rights if you have never learned what they are? How can you look them up if you aren’t even aware that they exist? This student may have forgotten the details after a few years, but now he has a memory of where to start his search if he wants to learn more. Don’t expect this age group to have critcal in depth understanding of the wisdom built into the constitution. That will come later. From what I have seen, some of the young people have never learned basic punctuation and capitalization. I think this must be a memorized skill.

LOL! I mean this has no pedagocic use. It is useful to memorize things but they should have a point. This is just pointless and exagerated. If the purpose is to enhance memory and improve logic, why not trying to memorize other more useful things related to grammar or sciences? And if the point is to enhance political awareness, what good is it to remember a bunch of names if you don’t know what their positions on politics are? Why not trying to fundment stuff and thinking instead of just remembering?
And let us not forget this is an A test. For what we know, the whole class could have failed it except for one or two children.

I don’t know. I never learned how to read cursive, or as my homeschooling teachers/parents call it, “loopy devil writing”

Pass the test??? Hell! I can’t even READ it…scan bigger next time!!! People that put small images online need SHOT.

Public schools are clearly worse now. The difference is that years ago we learnt the entire curriculum, kids nowadays are taught to pass exams and their overall knowledge of the subject is pretty limited.

I became a teacher and started working in the current school systems within the last 10 years.

I was surprised and not too pleased to find that the kind of reports I had written in elementary school (grades 3 and 4) which I still have… would have been graded as A’s in the middle school and, yes, even in the high schools where I have worked. I was a third grader in the late 60′s…

For example, I have a report on the queens of England, with short written pieces and photos (which I had to trace and color because we did not have color copiers or printers). One page per queen. The written pieces are a paragraph each. The whole thing on construction paper and bound together at the edge with yarn. I did it in either 3rd or 4th grade. Any 8th grade teacher I’ve met recently would be delighted with it, and some of the high school teachers would have been ecstatic if some of their students did even half of this.

I know I was a top student, however, I also know that the “bottom” level students were not scraping by with that much less as far as reports etc. However, some of them weren’t passed on to the next grade… which is where IMO we have failed many times over. How have schools justified promoting a student to the next grade!!!??? when they do not know even 60% of the material? How do you build on a foundation with that many holes? No city building inspector (except one being bribed) would let an edifice continue to be built on so much crumbling material and empty air!

We *have* seriously reduced our expectations of students for many things. I have heard this justified because we have added things I never would have had to know, like how to use a computer, how to find information on the internet and how to use computer programs like word, powerpoint, and excel. Still, the added content does not equal the amount we have lost.

Firstof all, most homeschooling parents are teaching cursive first the way we USED to. The public schools, however, ditched the “loopy devil writing” along with REAL phonics and gave us all the learning isabilities we have today. With your comment I am inclined to believe you are one of those public school graduates who willingly ate what they were spoon fed.